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Time For Pleasure

I received an email today from an over-busy, over-programmed friend complaining about how over-busy and over-programmed her life is. She has reason to complain. Her kids are in a lot of stuff, she has a part time business that eats up a lot of time and energy and she is not all that well organized, so stuff takes her a lot of time.

And she is miserable.

I have tried to be sympathetic in the past, but the more I listen, the more I realize — WE MAKE CHOICES!

As adults, we have the capacity to choose how we spend our 24 hours a day. I am getting ever more frustrated with those who choose to allow their loves to get overly programmed and overly busy and either wear it as a badge of pride, or, worse, expect pity.

Granted, some have to work ridiculously long hours just to make ends meet. I am fortunate that I, and most of my friends, are not in this camp. We are professionals and many of us work long hours, but it is not because we need the extra hours to get by.

I am proud that my wife and I a careful in the choices we make about how to spend our time. We don’t do a lot of housework, but we have lots of quality couple time – as a result our sex lives are great and we are a very happy couple. We don’t put our kids in activities all over town, but we spend tons of time playing with them, as opposed to chauffeuring them all over the place.

Having a balanced life is easy to say, and easy to achieve. It is about the choices we make — we have more control than many seem to believe we have.

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I just had this conversation with someone actually. I disagree. Yes we all make choices that shape our lives, however many of us have things happen to us that fill it up more than expected. For example, someone has a baby and they grow into a wonderful child -but with additional needs. Parents of these children can rarely leave the house. Also if someone close to you gets ill and needs looking after. Or perhaps because they are unable to work, you have to work more. People try for a baby and end up having twins or more! No-one can prepare for that time taker. People often make choices but don’t always expect the outcome that can indeed over fill one’s life much more than others surrounding them.

I can certainly agree that some people have a lot on their plate – much more than they have anticipated. If you have a special needs child or an ill spouse, for sure, it is tough to have time for pleasure. But this is the minority of people. What I observe – very often – is people allow themselves to become overwhelmed with what are pretty much the same day-to-day obligations any of us have. And, to them, i maintain, you can find time for pleasure if you make it a priority.

Good info. I recently posted on my blog about how moving from a large house to a smaller one – and selling, donating, or trashing the tons of stuff collected over years – has uncluttered not only our home but our brains too. You’re right in that so many of these obstacles are self imposed. My wife grew up as a national class athlete and swears she would never do that to our kids. I agree, too, that we have to give latitude for other people. How many people have to work several jobs just to pay bills. And always say busyness increases exponentially with each child. We clamp down pretty hard on the kids during the week and focus on family and homework and leave lots o space for weekend activities.